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Thursday, June 8, 2017

Too many books? Authors and discoverability

In the video below, I address the question: Are there too many books--especially in the wake of the indie publishing boom?The short answer is: Yes, there are too many books, if we define "too many" as a state of profusion in which not every book will find sufficient readers. (Some books won't find any readers.) But there have always been too many books. In every artistic endeavor, supply has always outstripped demand.In the present hyper-abundance of the Internet, the real battle is for discoverability. This is why writers have to market their stories like rock bands market their music. That is, they have to give readers plenty of opportunities to sample what they have on offer. This is a major motivation behind my YouTube channel.